Freedom to Marry to Spend $10 Million on Marriage Ads

Freedom to Marry announced a campaign Monday to spend $10 million on pro-marriage ads in the next three years. The first is not something that would persuade me, but I'm not the target audience.

I wrote something longer about how, with so many apparent needs in the community and with so little funding available for great ideas that would benefit lots of people, $10 million will be raised and spent on this. It's a lot of money to spend on this project, true, but it's not me or most of the people who read this site who'll decide how that money gets spent. The LGBT movement operates on the principles of supply and demand now, and the folks with money are demanding these sorts of campaigns so the folks who want careers in the movement are going supply them.

If you've got a problem with that, take it up with the way power is distributed in the US:

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Count me in - I'd have loved to see $10 million in ads targeting ENDA's passage last year. I really think that could have pushed it over the top.

And we wouldn't now be divided. Or have certain ex-journos filling PR statements posing as news stories for C3's; attempting to foster their marriage only agenda while non too subtly sabotaging civil rights bills and certain communities. Hey - you're no longer a journalist - you're a PR flack pushing an agenda.

People spending their money in a way that reflects their priorities and not Alex's priorities. Outrageous!

I am sure that you wish you had power to force them to spend it on transgender issues. That was the main reason for concocting the "LGBT" concept to begin with - to give trans activists a right to demand gay/lesbian resources for their selfish benefit.

While a lot of people mouth the term LGBT, many of us know that it was and is nothing more than a lie of political convenience. Follow the money and it will tell you a lot about what gay people think about your imaginary "LGBT" community.

Many gay men & lesbians & bisexuals who live in states that don't have nondiscrimination laws feel kinda put upon by folks in states that do pushing marriage over all else. Oh - and Ted got married somewhere else. Folks who have those protections elsewhere - funny thing - they didn't go for marriage before nondiscrimination bills in their states. I wonder why that was?

"It was, and is, my view that basic nondiscrimination legislation is the most pressing issue facing the LGBT community nationally — and by the numbers, it is. Some feel that gay marriage should be our prime objective. The reality is that not all LGBT people are in relationships and, regardless of whether you are and if you wish to marry, you can still endure discrimination on the basis of being LGBT with or without a marriage license in most of the United States.

But what struck me most was an example Thomas Walters gave on his blog, which he credits to Ted Martin of Equality Pennsylvania. The scenario goes:

You and your boyfriend get married on a Saturday afternoon, but are denied accommodations at a hotel on Saturday night, when you want to have your honeymoon. On Tuesday, you go to find a bigger apartment, but are told they do not rent to homosexuals, and when the current landlord finds out, she evicts you. On Wednesday, your employer finds out and fires you. By Thursday, you are married, but living in a cardboard box, homeless and without a job."

"When you starting ranking and putting a price limit on ending one particular oppression over another, we lose it all."

Lesson learned: do not post at 2am.

It should read:

"When you start ranking and putting a dollar limit on ending one particular oppression over another, we all lose."

As for the statement that someone can get married on a Saturday afternoon, and then are homeless by Thursday - well I could trip and break my arm while typing this comment too. It does nothing other than pander to division, fears and oppression ranking. Let's not blame marriage for discrimination, let's work on all these matters as a coalition. At the end of the day, if the money is pouring in to win marriage, why divorce ourselves from another possible victory?

It wasn't be said that one group was facing more discrimination - but that some types of discrimination were more pressing for all of those named groups. Nice deflection, though.

We're not working on these issues as a coalition - that's what the criticisms are of marriage over all other rights. When marriage is pushed in say - NH, MA or Missouri - by people who have those other nondiscrimination protections in their states or Cities - they are doing just what you suggest is wrong - ranking their well being and needs higher than others.

That is a ranking of one oppression over another - unfortunately - by those who saw fit to make sure it was an oppression they didn't live under any longer. You don't see anyone raising these concerns is places like NJ, CA, Iowa or Rhode Island. You also don't see that kind of nuanced, practical approach in most marriage advocates.

While I agree that non-discrimination legislature has to be a priority, I disagree with the basic premise of this article, which is that the folks running and funding Freedom to Marry don't have the right to spend their money in whatever way they see fit. They see fit to campaign for marriage equality. Doesn't mean that lots of them aren't also donating and campaigning for non-dsicrimination legislature, by the way. I know I am and have been, for both things. But the fact remains - it's their (our) money, they (we) get to decide how to spend it.

But I also fail to see how the campaign for marriage equality is hindering the drive for non-dsicrimination. Because one of the things that marriage equality will do is raise the level of understanding that LGBT people *are* people, and that we deserve to be treated that way. It can only help, IMO.